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As a physician, I really did not think too much about whether the nutritional supplements my patients were taking actually dissolved or not. All of the drugs I prescribed, whether or not they were brand-name or generic, were required to follow USP (US Pharmacopeias) standards. This means that the quality and dissolution of the tablet was regulated. This is not true for the nutritional supplements industry; again, it is basically an unregulated industry.

When I was doing research for my book, What Your Doctor Doesn’t Know about Nutritional Medicine [Thomas Nelson 2002], I found a study done at the University of Maryland. Here 9 different prescription prenatal vitamins were studied. Researchers did not look at what was in the tablet; they simply looked at whether the tablet dissolved or not. To my amazement, only 3 of the 9 prescription prenatal vitamins dissolved. What good does it do to have the right nutrients in the right amounts if your tablet doesn’t even dissolve? You are just wasting money. It is imperative that any supplements you choose to take must follow USP guidelines. This is the only way you can be assured that your tablets are dissolving.

Thank you to Dr Ray Strand for allowing us to publish this information.